The Bookkeepers Bang on the Ear

The common theme in marketing for yourself is that you should build a business that you have a passion for, a business that represents all that you believe in and strives to help others achieve the same in their lives.

I have worked with some great people and they all made me realise the truth of the above however it is not as easy as it seems.

Last year I was lucky enough to win a place on a blog coaching program with Caleb Spilchen, a young Canadian marketer who has really made great strides, he recommended that I create a blog on a topic that I was passionate about marketing, when you are actively involved in the subject that you are talking about it makes it super simple to create content for your blog.

Unfortunately although I am keen to lose weight I have no passion for the process of losing weight.

I have seen many friends ‘catch’ the running bug and away they went to super fitness, me I just want my old jeans back! Thus this blog was doomed to failure, the niche is super hot and responsive for those that are dedicated enough to build up a following and have the passion to achieve this, me I had neither.

Even Rich Schefrens training went over my head because even though we managed to identify my core skills, it still passed my by how I could monetise them thus the rest I gained little from as I was not ready for these later stages, the problem was of course me and not his training!

However that all changed today and actually over the last few days I knew the direction I had to go in but was unsure of how to achieve it.

The catalyst for this change was my bookkeeper and the missing direct debit, the benefit of outsourcing is that you do not have to think about these non core tasks, that is of course if you have set them up correctly which it transpired I had not thus there was an outstanding bill of $1050 to be paid pronto.

It is amazing when you are forced to figure out how you are going to pay for something, clarity suddenly descends, I do have the money to pay this bill but it brought rapidly home the need to sort our my marketing issues.

I have always been editing media since I was a kid either with a double tape deck or creating 6 hours of rock music on VHS cassette with flawless transitions from late night shows, this is a passion that remains within me, however this is the issue I have been faced with, what to do with these skills.

Fiverr is a great place to work if your local currency plays to your advantage, however as I am based in the UK, it means I can only do gigs that take under 15 minutes as my hourly rate is a minimum of $24, you can of course do short term work to get your name known but really you need to focus on the long term strategy and decide where you want your skills to take you.

Thus I was stumped as I was not sure how to monetize these skills, as I knew there were better video teams and I knew that Fiverr was not a realistic long term strategy.

Then the bill landed in front of me, time for that clarity to descend.

You should never aim to be the best in your industry, rather be the best you can. If you were the best in your industry then the people you desired to help could not afford you and therefore you have missed your goal. Therefore the best way to help them is to help yourself, become the best you can so you can provide more value to those you have a passion to help.

Therefore really I should be using my multimedia skills to market with passion and flair, developing and polishing my skills everyday so eventually I can pass these proven techniques onto those that wish to learn but want to shortcut the learning curve.

And now that I know what I need to do, I can return to Rich Schefrens training and finally do my SWOT analysis and planning properly as I have a core focus to my activity, do you appreciate the core skills you have and how to utilise them to best effect!